work,-from the immensity of knowledge which will assist uniting the details of manners, arts, sciences, in fine, of all the variety of human life, will naturally follow progression, grace and freshness of diction. Thus, the style will be comprehended in all those virtues and ta lents that I have exacted of the historian: but it is not on that account the less difficult of attainment. Let us now make the application. Here Hume realized the type that has just been traced? He is far from having reached it. His reason is powerful, his judgment full of sagacity, his style elegant and pure, but hardly any of the nobler qualities of the soul are to be found in his work. The zeal of accurateness, Hume possesses not; he is easily satisfied. The documents transmitted by intermedial historians relieve him of the necessity of referring to the primitive sources. He relates himself, that there were offered to him in France, fourteen manuscript volumes of James I., and all the correspondence of our ambassadors at London, and that, pre-occupied with the pleasures of Paris, he had entirely neglected that precious opportunity. In Hume, therefore, you will often find material errors, which he could easily have rectified if he had only had the curiosity to go and turn slowly over the leaves of the verbal processes of the House of Commons. Why has he not done so? Because Hume entertained, in certain parts of his work, a contempt of his subject. He has declared that he cannot conceive the power that Cromwell exercised over the assemblies, because he expressed himself like a rude peasant; these are his words. His academical taste, if you will permit me so to speak, shocked with certain vulgar, vehement, theological expressions, which Cromwell uttered, perceived not that ardent and sombre enthusiasm which burned in his words. He regarded as ridiculous what Cromwell spoke:-'I have not called myself to this place; others have called me to this place,' &c.,-subdividing his discourse into three parts, like a sermon. But if, instead of being shocked with certain coarse or pedantic expressions, he had penetrated deeper, he would have felt that thrilling force which agitates the soul; and he would have alternately explained the eloquence of Cromwell by his power, and his power by his eloquence. Neither do I find in Hume so much as I wish (I hesitate in making these remarks, Gentlemen, remembering that the eighteenth century regarded Hume as the first of historians, and that this opinion is still in vogue;) but notwithstanding I own that I do not perceive in Hume enough of the love of humanity and liberty. Hume, undoubtedly loves freedom of discussion, the existence of the two Houses of Parliament, and the liberty of the Press; these are common-place topics in England; there is not a minister even who does not think so ; but he loves them conventionally, from custom, and not with that pure and energetic instinct which fosters itself. He relates and analyzes the acts of stern and protracted injustice that occurred in the reign of Elizabeth and of Charles I. but without appearing to suffer in his narration; he is inattentive to that silent and continuous motion of English liberty, which disengages itself from so many gothic forms,which throws off now one weight, and now another, which, sometimes repulsed, but ever closing again, advances unceasingly. He perceives not this motion; he even reproaches some of his critics for having supposed its existence. This is an error of the historian,—an error of the erudite scholar,-an error of the man. He saw not this progressive motion, because he felt no interest in it,-because he liked not to recognize the principle of generous sentiments, and of sacred rights, even beneath rude and superannuated forms. Is it not Hume who tells us, in order to explain the whole of the English revolution The insults that chiefly inflamed the parliament and the nation, were the surplices, the rails round the altar, the bows exacted on approaching it, the liturgy, the violation of the Sabbath, the embroidered copes, the lawn sleeves,' &c.? It was for such things that the factions laboured to throw the State into such violent convulsions. This is the manner of Voltaire; it is Voltaire who has dictated that, but it is not therefore the more true. These things, ironically described by Hume, were the exterior, the dress of the revolution. But violent, real, and profound passions agitated within; there was experienced much of regret, of longing, of noble and culpable ambition; the whole of human nature was in agitation: it was not merely copes and surplices. It is the method employed by Voltaire in the Essai sur les Mœurs,' to amuse the human race, to suppose it always duped, and for this end he ever represents great effects as springing from trivial causes ; but is this the truth? Neither do I find sufficiently expressed in Hume that love of country, which I regard as a virtue of the historian. I certainly do not wish for declamation; but I would like to discover the soul of an old Englishman; I would like to see him attached to his country, as to a friend, whose fortune one follows through all the changes of life; whom one beholds growing, developing himself, attaining glory and importance in the world. Thus, I would wish to see him participating, now with sorrow, now with pride and joy in the fortune of England, in the developement of that great and imposing sovereignty. Now, to follow out my division, which is almost as regular as that of Cromwell's sermon, the qualities of the mind are undoubtedly more manifest in the work of Hume than the qualities of the soul. He possesses a high degree of intelligence, but it is the intelligence of reason, and not of imagination; he explains very well all the important facts, sets them forth with precision, arranges them with order and method. Does he penetrate with profound sagacity into human passions? I venture to doubt of it; I make bold to say that all those republican and royalist spirits, called into action and publicity by the English revolution, have not always been understood by Hume. He pretends that the Whigs accused him of not having wept over the fate of Strafford; but I think he has not fully comprehended the soul of that man, and that his tears even, if he wept, do not render entire justice to Strafford. Has he indeed recorded the generous resolution of Strafford, who urged the king to subscribe the condemnation decreed by the House of Peers, he adds these words: 'Perhaps Strafford hoped that this singular mark of generosity would induce the king to protect him; perhaps he abandoned his life, thinking it irrecoverably lost; and seeing himself in the hands of his enemies, he absolutely despaired of escaping the many perils which sur rounded him on all sides.' Thus the offer of Strafford was a calculation, a sort of experiment made upon the will of the monarch, or at best the desperate resolution of a man who surrenders what he cannot retain. No-the Whigs themselves, I am certain, never imposed on Strafford a more unjust anathema than this supposition of Hume, whose insulting nature he yet imperfectly understood. He thought to justify the prudence of Strafford, and he perceived not that he injured a great character. It is here that we discover, perhaps, an unpleasant connection between the sceptical spirit of the philosopher and his historical views. For one who entertained the doctrine of selfish interest, which Hume has disavowed in one of his treatises, but to which all his philosophy leads, it was a little embarrassing to comprehend the disinterested devotedness of Strafford, and his heroical abandoning of life: Hume has, therefore, disowned them. The literary criticism of Hume's History and an account of Robertson in our next communication. Edinburgh, 1st Feb. 1832. 0. MR. JOHN MACKAY WILSON'S SONGS. We believe there are very few living authors who have written more songs than our townsman Mr. J. M. Wilson-and none, we are sorry to say, who take less care of them when written. Many of them have appeared in numerous periodicals, but by far the greater part have not even received this fugitive publicity, and he has not troubled himself to publish them in any form whatever. Several of the latter have come into our hands, which, with selections from the former, we shall from time to time transfer to our pages, conscious that by so doing we shall gratify all our readers, to whom the genuine simplicity and originality of the true Scottish Song is acceptable. The first we select is intitled "My Faither's Hearth," and its quiet graphic power and pathos will find a passage to the bosom of every one. No. I. MY FAITHER'S HEARTH. CAN I forget the woody braes, Where love an' innocence foregather,— I've crooned a sang amang the heather? It was a waefu' hour to me, When I frae them an' love departed ;- My faither blest me-broken-hearted! My aulder brothers took my hand,— Can I forget her fareweel kiss! An' look-like words by lightenings spoken !— Forget!-na! till life's cords are broken! "The Gowany Braes" is in a different mood and manner, and is enough to make a bachelor renounce his state of single blessedness. No. II. THE GOWANY BRAES. In our young-young days, When the gowany braes Were our temple o' joy and glee, Some dour auld body would shake his head, Your mother spained you wi' a canker worm, When the gowany braes Kenn'd the feet o' my love and me, Some ill-matched carle would girn and say— 'Puir things! wi' a twalmonth's marriage and ye Will find love like a snawba' decay!' Stupid auld carle-leeing auld carle, Your mother spained you wi' a canker worm, Like our love unchanged, hae their youthfu' form. In our grey-haired days, When the gowany braes Are owre steep for our feet to climb, When her back is bowed, and her lovely e'e,— Once bright as a beam frae the sun,-is dim, She'll be still my bit lassie to me. Stupid auld body-wicked auld body- An' her bosom a brae where it blooms for ever. "The Bacchanalian's Sang" is as graphic a picture of the kind of happiness and domestic comfort which a drunkard enjoys, as it is pos sible to conceive. No. III. THE BACCHANALIAN'S SANG. STAP, stap, we'll hae anither gill, Ne'er mind a lang-tongued beldame's yatter, There's Bet, when I gang hame the night, Ca' me a brute, an' stap my singin'. Ca' me a drucken gude for naethin'! A dish o' tongues is a' she'll gie me! Gang, gang! for dearsake!-that's a blessin' !' She rins to get her claes away, But o' the kist-the key's a-missin'! The younkers a' set up a skirl, They shriek an' cry-O dinna mither!' I slip to bed, and fash the quarrel Bet creeps beside me unco dour, I clap her back an' say- My dawty!' To this "The Temperate Man's Sang" forms an exquisite counter-part. No. IV. THE TEMPERATE MAN'S SANG. NA, dinna press, I winna stay, For drink shall ne'er abuse me, Though ance I liked a social gill,— I like my wifie better still, Our Jennies an' our Johnnies. There's something by my ain fireside,- |